Third Rogue's Corner wasn't one individual, but rather a light-hearted look at the Villages at any global sporting event (i.e. Olympics, Winter Olympics, Commonwealth Games etc).
Cos - let's be honest...you put thousands of the planet's elite, fittest, healthiest young men and women all in one place, from all over the globe, and they've done no normal fun stuff that most people their age do..nothing but work their asses off for a brief moment at these Games..and then...
Well I reckon you can guess. Mix in a little bit of alcohol..
What's notable ten-odd years from when I wrote this, is the evolution of communication apps (i.e. Tinder)...it doesn't bear thinking the insane thrashing Tindr has/will have be getting at these places...
LET THE FUN BEGIN
With both the winter Olympics and the Commonwealth Games happening during the first quarter of 2006, we in Rogues Corner have begun nodding at each other with knowing, wry smiles.
“Why?” you may ask. Well, at both these events, and the summer Olympics, the participants all live together in the athletes’ Village which emerges like a utopian
mirage for the duration of said Games.
The Village houses thousands of elite athletes who embody the absolute physical potential of the human race. Each finely toned individual is the result of not only phenomenal genetics but a lifetime spent training relentlessly to peak during – you guessed it
– the Games.
This sounds pretty good to us but, sadly, it’s a very exclusive club. Only coaches, trainers and competitors are allowed in.
Nelson Diebel, a double gold medallist at the 1992 Barcelona Olympics, described it as “a two-week-long private party for thousands of hard-bodies”. It has also been described as “an adult Disney World”.
Further spiking this potent social cocktail is the dynamic which inevitably develops at Villages – that between the serious Olympians (there to compete for medals) and the “Olympic tourists” (the vast majority of athletes who have no realistic medal chance and
are there just to make up the numbers).
Stunning American high jumper Amy Acuff told Playboy magazine: “One of the big misconceptions is that every athlete is 100 per cent serious about being there. A
number of athletes in the Village – people who know they don’t have a chance – are there to have a party.”
American shot put medallist John Godina reveals: “Athletes who are knocked out early have basically a two-week, all-expenses-paid vacation with nothing to do, and that’s when things happen.”
So, what exactly does happen when you put up to 15,000 of the most physically perfect human specimens in one place at the same time, with their glycogen levels skyrocketing and energy practically bursting out of their skin?
Sex. Lots and lots of it, that’s what.
American javelin thrower Breaux Greer, who competed at the 2000 Sydney Olympics, says:
“There’s a lot of sex going on. You get a lot of people who are in shape and, you know, testosterone’s up and everybody’s attracted to everybody.”
Condom machines had to be refilled every two hours at the 1990 Albertville winter Games in France.
Seventy thousand condoms were allocated to the Sydney Olympic Village and went so quickly that another 20,000 were shipped in. Even then they’d run out three days before the end of the Games. This number ballooned to 130,000 for the 2004 Athens
Olympics. You get the picture.
Modern technology has made getting together even easier. All athletes have access to free internet connections in Villages. Alpine ski racer Marco Buechel revealed that during the 2002 Salt Lake City winter Olympics “everybody used it” and, despite not being able to speak a word of Greek, he arranged via email to meet a gorgeous Greek skier. “We tried to talk, which wasn’t very successful.”
But this small linguistic hiccup failed to thwart their chemistry. “It was very beautiful ... a beautiful international incident.”
After many failed leads, Rogues Corner managed to find a great Kiwi athlete willing to spill all. He has not only represented New Zealand at both Commonwealth and Olympic level, but (after a few beers) told such outrageous stories that we had no option but to cloak him in total anonymity.
“If you don’t get laid at least three times while you’re there, you must be a complete munter,” our still-buff stool pigeon claimed.
He revealed that he bedded a lithe Australian gold medallist from his sporting discipline.
“The medallists did even better. Two or three different partners per night was quite possible for them and some of them took advantage.”
Luckily for our man, his discipline typically finished early-ish during the Games, leaving him and his mates plenty of time to get stuck in.
As it is with us mortals, alcohol is the athletes’ social lubricant. Years of alcohol deprivation come crashing to a halt as virtually all athletes let loose.
The drink gets drunk either at venues outside or is smuggled into the Villages (booze is officially banned inside).
Our Kiwi Rogue and his room-mate took turns “rotating” – letting one another have their room to themselves – and this generous privacy policy helped no end for New Zealand’s finest. These guys would often head out of the Village to local nightspots and would mingle with other athletes – different nationalities but typically from the same sporting discipline – and the fireworks would begin.
There is a slim window of opportunity for the rest of us. Some crafty characters worm their way into the Villages under the guise of being “Village volunteers”, performing rudimentary duties such as showing athletes where to go.
Our chap assured us that many of the volunteers were quite sexy, too, and plenty of athlete/volunteer carry-on went on.
But like everything that sounds too good to be true there is a downside to being in a Games Village and it was summed up ever so eloquently by Diebel:
“The only thing you’re deprived of is fat. If you’re the rare athlete who likes sedentary bodies, you’re out of luck.”
Games Villagers, Rogues Corner salutes you!
My second Rogue's Corner was an absolute pearler - George Best. Pretty much one of the very top handful of men ever to play football in it's entire history AND a handsome funny devil AND a merchant of carnage on a catatonic level.
It beggars belief his story hasn't been made into a major motion picture.
I really got a kick out of writing this one, tinged with sadness just a short time after his death.
SIMPLY THE BEST
Only George Best could have graced this issue’s Rogues Corner. He is arguably the greatest sporting rogue in history.
For most New Zealanders, though, chances are (especially if you’re under 40) you wondered what all the fuss was about a few weeks ago when his untimely death at 59 was followed by the biggest funeral in Irish history.
Rather than grope awkwardly for superlatives to describe him, it seems far more apt to quote others in the know. South Americans Pele and Diego Maradona, widely acknowledged as two of the greatest soccer players of all time, respectively said: “He is the best player in the world” and “He is my all-time favourite player."
Legendary Manchester United manager Sir Alex Ferguson gushed: “He is unquestionably the greatest.” Best’s manager while at United, Sir Matt Busby, uttered: “You don’t coach him – he’s a genius.”
You get the picture. In his glory years with United from the mid-1960s until 1974, Best’s phenomenal talent exploded like an atom bomb on the British then the European football scene.
What made him so great? For starters, his gravity defying, trapeze-artist balance, feet which seemed attached to the ball, devastating pace. Then there was his clinical finishing (179 goals in 466 matches for United). He had pinpoint-accurate passing, tackled and headed exceptionally, and had surprising strength for a slim man of average height. Add to this his spirit, arrogance and courage, and few authorities argue there has ever been a better white player in football history.
This talent saw him take United to glory with English League Championships in 1965 and 1967 and the European Cup in 1968, the year he was voted European Player of the Year. For these reasons alone, Best’s name was destined to be etched in history.
But there is more. As well as his talent, Best was beautiful; blessed with ridiculously good looks. These combined factors made him the first real superstar of the English game.
After a mesmerising display against Portuguese champions Benfica in 1968, his piercing blue eyes and mane of unkempt hair saw him dubbed “El Beatle” by the Portuguese press, bringing him global fame.
He couldn’t have timed it better. Britain’s Swinging Sixties cultural revolution was in full swing and Besty was deified as a bona fide icon of the era along with the Beatles, the Rolling Stones and Twiggy.
As the world watched on in awe, Georgie Boy was having it all. He began biting off as much as he could chew of all the exquisite pleasures his massive celebrity attracted. Nightclubs, cocktail parties, fashion boutiques and modelling appearances.
Oh, and the women. Best loved them as much as they loved him and he began riding an endless carousel of beautiful, blonde, mini-skirted babes, including more than one Miss World (“I used to go missing quite a lot ... Miss Canada, Miss United Kingdom, Miss World”).
When asked once by friend Michael Parkinson in an interview how near to kick-off George had made love, he famously replied: “Half-time!”
Best’s energies gradually evolved from football to hard-core partying. “I spent a lot of money on booze, birds and fast cars. The rest I just squandered” is probably his most famous quote, showcasing his impish sense of humour so celebrated and mourned at his funeral.
Another famous Best anecdote occurred the morning after another gargantuan night of playboy hedonism, when a young hotel bellboy was beckoned into the room and discovered Best in bed with the current Miss World, a magnum of champagne and tens of thousands of pounds in cash won gambling.
He exclaimed: “George, where did it all go wrong?” Where it went wrong depends on your definition of wrong. At the time, Best was living a life that the Rogues team is very, very envious of. Aside from his humorous quips, Best’s philosophy on it all was intriguing. “I was born with a great gift,” he said, “and sometimes with that comes a destructive streak.”
Right up until near the end, he maintained that nothing went wrong, as countless commentators would have us believe. He said that he simply got sick of it all. “Just as I wanted to outdo everyone when I played, I had to outdo everyone when we were out on the town.”
Best was well aware of his failings and once tellingly said: “If I had been ugly you never would have heard of Pele.”
Rogues Corner will not be drawn into yet more conservative tut-tutting. Yes, Best paid the price for his gradual descent into serious alcoholism (and all the negative consequences) with his untimely demise.
Yet he retired from football aged 27 after nearly a decade of legendary soccer and packed more life into his 59 years than we can begin to dream of.
George Best, Rogues Corner salutes you!
In 2004-2005 I wrote a stand-alone column in a New Zealand sporting magazine called 'Player'. I was absolutely delighted with my idea for the column getting accepted:- 'The Rogues Corner'. It was to be all about sports-people who had reached global infamy for their sporting talent, but were also a bit troubled and/or naughty.
It was a bit more orderly and edited than my earlier web stuff which was pure writing anarchy and a bit sloppy.
I know my old boss Jim Boult (currently Mayor of Queenstown!) was a fan!
There was only one to kick it all off.....
DAVID BOONE - 52 NOT OUT
Extreme excellence and extreme hedonism in sport are like petrol and water. They’re just not meant to mix. But some very special individuals have risen to conquer seemingly insurmountable odds and excel – simultaneously – in both.
Here at Rogues Corner we’ll be performing a monthly doffing of the PLAYER cap to those special souls whohave inspired awe with their sporting greatness while behaving like utter rapscallions.
One illustrious sporting rogue pretty much chose himself to kick off our sports varlet hall of fame: David Boon. Why? Well, because of one particular record achieved by the cricketing legend from Tasmania.
Boon is one of Australian cricket’s favourite sons. His batting prowess was awesome. He made more than 7400 test runs in 107 tests averaging 43.65, with 21 centuries and 32 half-centuries. In addition, he played 181 one-day matches, averaging 37 and scoring just under 6000 runs. Yep, despite being short and rotund, he really was one of the world’s most prolific, consistent and successful international batsmen.
But his most famous knock is 52 made in 1989 ...52 cans, that is. Unbelievably, Boony consumed this monstrous amount of beer on a flight between Sydney and Heathrow en route to England to compete in the Ashes series. Of course, he subsequently denied the
incident ever took place and he apparently “‘never set out to break the existing record” (held by Rod Marsh, 46 cans, 1983).
The Australian Cricket Board worked furiously trying to keep the whole matter under wraps. But there were way too many witnesses, particularly the main sell-out,
Dean Jones, who sat next to Boon on the flight and later roomed with him on the tour. Jones had taken his dad’s advice to sit next to Boon, so as to soak up as much cricketing information and advice from him as possible. Some chance.
The other stool pigeon was veteran Geoff Lawson, who claimed to have kept the score on the back of flight sickbags. Airline staff, far from discouraging this laddish behaviour, must be credited with keeping count early on (the tradition was apparently as entrenched with flight staff as it was with the team).
Like true professionals, they kept the supply coming as Boony mercilessly punched through the cans, “well on target” on the first leg from Sydney to Singapore.
Twenty-two beers down and his walrus moustache now well soaked, Boon started dispensing advice to Jones as the next flight left Singapore. Jones, however, was
fading fast after his relatively modest consumption and retired to the upper level of the plane to sleep.
The keg-shaped Tasmanian was settled into a steady rhythm and without Jones he still had great support from team-mates Mark Taylor, Carl Rackemann, Merv Hughes, Geoff Marsh and Tom Moody.
Some eight hours later, Jones was jolted from his sleep by a tumultuous eruption of applause as the flight captain congratulated Boon over the loudspeaker for decimating Marsh’s 46-can record with the new total of 52.
Furious team manager Bob Simpson turned “purple with anger” and Jones cheekily suggested to selector Laurie Sawle that he send Boon home so Jones could bat in his place.
Just thinking about it makes us at Rogues Corner feel bloated. Over about 24 hours, Boon averaged at least two cans an hour, every hour. And before boarding at Sydney airport, he’d had a few which didn’t count.
Lawson hilariously lamented that his greatest regret was that he never rescued the sickbags upon which he’d kept the score. “They would have been worth a fortune,” he correctly noted. “You can imagine Tony Greig selling replicas of them, summer after
summer.”
Despite his intake, Boony somehow “kind of managed to walk” unaided from the plane at Heathrow. He successfully refrained from chundering and/or falling over (as opposed to Marsh, who in 1983 was rolled off the plane on a baggage trolley).
There was still the British press conference gauntlet to run, however. Mercifully, although the Aussie media had been tipped off about the record, they made a collective pact not to question the near-comatose batting stalwart.
This protection and the sheer miracle that the British media pack failed to notice the wobbly little Tasmanian (much less smell the alcohol fumes wafting from his breath and pores) saw him escape scot-free.
Boony then pulled off the unthinkable: he went straight to a sponsor’s cocktail party with his team. Incredibly, while there he chewed through what must have been the three ugliest pints of his life.
Back at the hotel, a boozy Boon lapsed into a 36-hour comathon, snoring like a tortured walrus. He slept right through the team’s first two training sessions.
Jones later recalled that Simpson suggested that “when David [wakes] up he should come and have a quiet chat with me”. Already on probation (along with a chastised Merv Hughes, who had leaked the story in a few interviews), Boon was fined $A5000 by a furious Simpson. He came within an inch of being sent home but luckily for the rest of the team he wasn’t.
Dried out, Boon went on to average 55 and make more than 1500 runs for the tour, helping Australia reclaim the Ashes which they held until earlier this year.
Despite countless attempts by professional sportsmen and heavy boozers alike, there are no reports of the record being beaten. English rugby player Mike Tindall apparently came close to 50 cans while flying back to London from Sydney after the World Cup win.
David Boon, Rogues Corner salutes you
